How to Use the Wiki Activity

The Wiki activity is a collaborative tool that allows your students to contribute to the same activity. Students are able to create and edit pages as well as build on other students’ pages.

Adding the Wiki Activity to Your Course

To add a Wiki to your course, locate the Administration block on the main course page and select Turn editing on.

Next, locate the module you want to add the Wiki to. At the bottom of the module, select Add an activity or resource. Select Wiki and then Add.

Editing Wiki Settings

Once you have added the Wiki, you can modify the following settings:

1. General
   • Wiki name: A required field

• Description: An optional field where you can enter a description or information for students
• Wiki mode: A collaborative wiki allows all students in your course to edit one wiki. An individual wiki gives each student their own wiki to edit; students cannot see other students’ wikis with this setting.
  • NOTE: You cannot change this field once you save the settings.
• First page name: Enter the name for the first page of the Wiki. This field is required.
  • NOTE: You cannot change this field once you save the settings.

2. Format: This determines the default format for each page in the Wiki. HTML is the recommended format. If you check the Force Format box, users won’t be able to change to a different format when creating a page. If the box is unchecked, users will be asked to select the format each time they create a page in the Wiki.

Note: You cannot add the Wiki activity to the gradebook. If you would like your Wiki to be graded, you must create a manual grade item in the gradebook.

Once you have selected the desired settings, click Save and return to course to return to the main course page, or select Save and display to edit the first page of your Wiki.

Editing a Wiki Page

The first time you access your Wiki, you will see one of two options depending on whether you checked the Force Format box in the Wiki settings. If you did not select Force Format, you will be asked to select the format. Note that the New page title field will be filled in based on the text entered into the First page name field in the Wiki settings. Select the format and then click the Create page button:

If you did select Force Format in the Wiki settings, you will skip the above page and be taken directly to the Edit page for the first page of your Wiki:

It is important to note that any information added to a Wiki page will not carry over if the course is duplicated into another shell. If there is content that needs to be carried over to another course shell, it is best to enter that into the description field of the Wiki settings.

Adding Additional Wiki Pages

To add a Wiki page that branches off the main page, follow this format when entering the link into the page:

[[New Page]]

The link must have double brackets surrounding it on both sides. Click the Save button. The link will be displayed in red:

Next, click on the red link. If you did not select Force Format in the Wiki settings, you will be asked to select the format. You will then be taken to the edit page for the page you just created.

Linking to an Existing Page

To link to an existing page, enter the name of the page in brackets. In the example above, [[Page One]] will link back to the first page of the Wiki.

Using the Wiki Toolbar

The Wiki toolbar displays the following options:

1. View: Allows you to view the page. You can move between pages using any existing links.
2. Edit: Allows you to edit the page you are on.
3. Comments: Allows you to add comments to the page. Other users can see the comments, but they are separate from the information on the page. Users will be able to see who left the comment and the date and time of the comment.
4. History: Allows you to see the history of the page you are on. By clicking on the version number, you can see the changes that were made. If necessary, you can also Restore this version by clicking the link. This will make the version you selected become the new version.
5. Map: Displays a list of the pages in the Wiki. You can also see any pages that have been orphaned (that is, no other pages link to them).
6. Files: Displays a list of files uploaded in the Wiki.
7. Administration: This link is not available to students. Instructors can delete pages from this tab. Note that you cannot delete the first page of the Wiki.

Additionally, if an individual Wiki has been created, instructors can view each student’s wiki via the User drop-down menu at the top right: